Australian Schools: Helping You To Choose.

As I mentioned in my most recent post, which was about our Australia Day celebrations, the Wednesday following Australia Day saw all of our school kids returning after the long summer holidays.

First -the back to school news.

How was Elizabeth’s first day at REAL school? As you probably know, she’s been at real school for a year already, but only as a “preppie”. The prep year is voluntary, but now she went back as a year one student. And the big news is?

She is now allowed to wear a blue hat! You see, all the preppies wear yellow hats for that first year, you wouldn’t believe how proud a little girl can be to get a blue hat.

Now – choosing a school for your child.

Before I start, I realise that many of you will have no interest in this post. If you’re not moving to Australia with children, then you don’t really need to know about schools. For you, why not check out an earlier post about surfing and Australian beaches. You can even check out the live beach cams from all around Australia.

But, for those with kids……

I have been asked in the past to try to compare Australia’s schools system with that of the U.K.’s, in terms of trying to find out which country offers the best education. That is still on my list of posts to do, but I do know it would take a fair amount of research. Perhaps that’s why I haven’t got around to it yet.

I will get it done, but until I do, I would think the next best thing is a way of looking at how Australian schools compare with each other in terms of educational standards. But that too would take a great deal of research.

Unless I could get someone else to do it……..

Enter the “myschool” website.

The website, which is run by The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) has caused a bit of a stir. Opinion is divided here in Australia, but then I remember the same thing happening back in the UK when school performances were made public there.

Quite a few people would like to see the website shut down and maybe one day they will get their way. But it is online now and it’s worth a look if you’re considering which school to send your child to.

I’ve created this demo video so you can see how it works…….

Personally, I’m not so sure it’s a great idea to have this kind of information online. I seem to remember back in the UK the many rumours of schools “cheating” the system to get better ratings. None of the tricks they used, of course, were in the interest of the child.

So perhaps these kinds of statistics aren’t the best way to choose a school. Just be aware that as you look through those stats. Sometimes it’s better to go by what the locals, the people who really use a school, think of it.

I'm BobinOz and I moved to Australia in November 2007 after living in England for a very long time. Why did I move and what's it like here? All this and more answered right here at Bobinoz. Click here to read more on my about me page.